Retina, Use OSX or Win7. Toss LR and PS +whatever else you use on it. Buy a 1-2 TB external and set your LR library to that as to not eat up your internal SSD. Saves you a ton of money. Thats my feeling on it as I think win 8 sucks for anything without a touch screen.

does anyone use a macbook air for lightroom? i'm going to be traveling for about a year next year and i need something really lightweight, that is up to the challenge of editing photos. I don't want anything heavier than a 13 inch Macbook air.....Is it up to the challenge?

does anyone use a macbook air for lightroom? i'm going to be traveling for about a year next year and i need something really lightweight, that is up to the challenge of editing photos. I don't want anything heavier than a 13 inch Macbook air.....Is it up to the challenge?

Hi,

Long time reader, first post....

I was in this market last year. I looked at a 13" MBP (non retina) and the resolution was less than the MBA. Now other than loosing the DVD drive (which has never really been a hassle for me - there are a million simple work arounds) the only thing I would like on my MBA is the black rim around the screen (again accessories available).

I've had my MBA 13" for about a year now - LOVE IT! Its been to the mountains in the alps with me, its been to Nepal, its been work and back, and NEVER let me down.

They have updated it again since I bought mine, but the one I have will happily cope with RAW files from the 5D MK3 - no lagg in LR/PS editing.

I've even been able to render 500+ megapixel panoramas whilst looking and retouching other photos in LR.

The only downside I have with my MBA is the harddisk, whilst very fast its a little small. I was cheap and bought the 128gb version - if you get one get the 256gb version. With only 2 USB ports on it it can be a juggle if you have to use an external drive when downloading pictures. Having said that my MBA is purely for this job and so only has LR/PS on it, and if I take 50gb of photos on holiday I need to looks at how much I am shooting.

For video Again amazingly quick, but this is where the HDD really starts to fill up.

Thanks for the suggestions. I am sorry if was not clear but I will never run osx. I only used the mac pro ret for its screen. If I was to consider the mac air I would get the asus zenbook prime 13.3 ips. It has a 100% rgb screen. Just hoping for something cheaper since I use it a few times a year tops.

Fujitsu T730/T731 tablets or the older T4220 - you get a Wacom tablet to work with, just like a Cintiq. I use mine to write code in Visual Studio, then can tether directly to LR for capture, then edit in PS5 with full brush pressures. With a 256GB SSD, the T731 is just as smooth as my quad-proc, 16-core Xeon desktop, albeit not as fast.